The Christian tendency to rush to judgement to soon or too often
stifles dialog. In David Cape’s book Slow
to Judge, he shows that if we listen, we may be given a chance to
speak. However, if you are listening in order to fulfill your agenda of
hoping to speak and be heard, you miss the point.
David Capes, a professor at Houston Baptist University, discusses
love, forgiveness, phobias, and problems with the cultural view of tolerance. While the book starts off slow,
most of the substance is in the last third of the book, especially in examining
the definition of authentic tolerance and exploring when it is acceptable to
judge and when it is not.
The sub-title of this book turned me off at first: “Sometimes it’s
okay to listen”. Isn’t it
ALWAYS okay to listen? Isn’t listening a way to express kindness or love? But Capes points out that sometimes
there are things that are not worth listening to. If it is too offensive and injurious,
we should not waste our time on toxic thinking – racism, facism, terrorism,
etc. Sometimes it is okay
to judge. We need to speak out against evils like human trafficking, not be
tolerant of it.
Authentic tolerance intrinsically means handling things that make
us uncomfortable, requiring us to practice a tolerance based on humility, an
open heart, and love that gives the other person dignity and respect. Because of general revelation, any
culture enlightened by truth can be no other than truth revealed by our God and
Father -- not promoting relativism but truth that is common for everyone
because it is real. We can all learn from each other.
We don’t have to just join hands and talk about all we have in
common. We can discuss our
differences as well, and listen, and learn from each other, even when it makes
us uncomfortable. I highly
recommend this book, especially the last three chapters.
Disclaimer: I received a complimentary
copy of this book from BookLook in exchange for my honest review.
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